Luanda - Angola's itinerant ambassador, José Guerreiro Alves Primo, arrived this Wednesday in Dili, to head the Electoral Observation Mission of the Community of Portuguese-speaking Countries (CPLP) for the election of the President of the Republic of East Timor, set for March 19, ANGOP learned from an official source.
Angola, as "pro tempore" president of the CPLP, appointed its ambassador, José Guerreiro Alves Primo, to head the Electoral Observation Mission (MOE), which includes diplomats from the member states, officials from the Executive Secretariat of the organisation and a delegation of Portuguese deputies, representing the Parliamentary Assembly of the community.
There are 16 candidates running for the presidential elections, including Francisco Guterres Lu-Olo, current President of the Republic since 2017, and José Ramos-Horta, current leader of the Frente Revolucionária de Timor-Leste Independente (FRETILIN), who was a presidential candidate in 2007, 2012 and 2017.
José Ramos-Horta has already been President of the Republic, between 2007 and 2012, and Minister of Foreign Affairs, in 2002.
Among the current candidates, we can also highlight the priest Martinho Gusmão, who left the priesthood to run for President, the former East Timor ambassador to the United States of America, Constâncio Pinto, as an independent, and Lere Anan Timur, general and former Commander of the East Timor Armed Forces.
Milena Pires, wife of current CPLP Executive Secretary Zacarias da Costa, is also running, as well as Isabel Ferreira, wife of former Timorese President Taur Matan Ruak, and Ângela Freitas, a doctor and leader of the East Timor Labour Party, who ran for president in 2017.
